The Middle Eastern city of Dubai is in the process of creating the region’s largest photovoltaic manufacturing plant.

What Happened?

A recent article in Dubai’s Khaleej Times discusses the city’s plans to create a photovoltaic manufacturing plant. The plant, made by Solar Technologies FZE, will be 93,000 square meters, and able to produce solar panels of 5.7 square meters, making it the largest solar panel manufacturing plant in the Middle East.

The plant will generate 130 megawatts of power annually and will go into production in the last quarter of 2010.

Solar Technologies FZE CEO Dilip Rahulan states, “The mission of Solar Technologies is to accelerate the adoption of solar photovoltaic by rapidly expanding the manufacturing capacity and significantly reducing the cost of solar modules through innovations and manufacturing excellence.”

Why is this important to the future?
The building of the solar panel manufacturing plant is just one of the results of Dubai’s newest program, Green Dubai 2008. It also includes the green building initiative to be used in all buildings from now on as well as advances in sustainable development.

Managing director and CEO, Saeed Mohammed Al Tayer, says “We have explored alternative energies, namely wind power, solar power, and tidal power- we are conducting a feasibility study for other cheaper proven sources of energy.” Dubai’s city-wide initiative to create a green environment is the first in this part of the world.

What to Watch

The Middle East has potential to grow as a clean-tech materials manufacturing hub based on its vast resources in natural gas which can be used as an energy resources to power factories, and also as a hydrocarbon feedstock for creating different types of materials. If Dubai can leverage its resources of time, money, and laborers it might surprise the world as a clean-tech hub.